


The Puzzle-Piece Man and The Invisible King

by BeLiEVeRiNrAnDOmCApiTaliZatiOn



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Abstract, Alternate Universe, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-23
Updated: 2013-06-23
Packaged: 2017-12-15 20:23:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/853690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeLiEVeRiNrAnDOmCApiTaliZatiOn/pseuds/BeLiEVeRiNrAnDOmCApiTaliZatiOn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A/U: Hannibal Lecter is an inmate in the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. The goings on of the Hannibal TV series is in his head; an ideal world where he can sate his hunger and play God to a little, powerless man named Will Graham.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Puzzle-Piece Man and The Invisible King

The first time Hannibal Lecter meets William Graham, the latter is a puzzle-piece man made of shards of glass and the former is an invisible king.

Hannibal doesn’t _like_ Will, no. No, he _adores_ him, spends raven-coloured evenings spelling out his name on a notebook, spilling the poetry of Will’s mind like papercuts and wine and a heart beating for the last time in his hands. He strings his thoughts in his fingers like Cat’s Cradle and molds them into sculptures, weaves them into tapestries.

Will is art, with the damp throb of his heart fluttering behind birdcage ribs.

Hannibal likens Will to a partridge. A bird of quiet beauty and fear. Will is made of sweat and musk, of dark hair curling at his temple and at the scarlet nape of his neck. His face is a constellation of hollowed cheeks and haunted eyes and Hannibal wants to frame him this way, wants to paint pictures of Will in broad strokes and invite others in to view his creation, tell them _this is it, this is him. I did this. I made this._

To Hannibal, Will is a shattered stained glass window.  To Hannibal, Will is a treasure. To Hannibal, Will is a masterpiece.

Will Graham makes Hannibal visible.

Will sits across from him each evening and places a crown upon Hannibal’s head with his words and desperate, quiet need. He graces Hannibal with a cape and scepter when his body rocks and bucks with the shock of a seizure. He is a willing puppet and presents Hannibal with his strings in the way he reaches for him, sees him as safety, and even when he sobs and breaks and says _don’t lie to me,_ he does not mean it. Hannibal cradles his face with gentle hands when his eyes roll back and, though in that moment Will cannot see, he feels _seen._

Then he gives Will keys and a gun and Will kills a man with a voice like titanium to protect a woman he loves even though all he is doing is protecting Hannibal, whom he loves more than anyone – including Will – will ever know.

After, when his brown curls tangle in the snow, Will forgets that he is alive.

And after, when the white of snow turns to the white of hospital sheets, Hannibal reminds him.

And after, Hannibal kills a girl with yellow hair to remind Will that that could change very soon.

And after, Will draws a clock for a shield and Hannibal knights him with an ebony-handled knife.

Will’s words fall through the cracks in his lips and he leaks blood like fire and Hannibal uses paperclips and safety pins to reattach his shattered limbs. Will asks if he can paint a smile on his face like he is a porcelain doll and Hannibal complies, whispering against his mouth _You may not feel like it, but I need you to smile_.

So the puzzle-piece man does and the king smiles back.

And the king smiles when Professor Alana Bloom presses her lips together in a thin line, sitting on the other side of his glass cell, and says, “Dr. Lecter, William Graham is not real.”

The king smiles and says, “That’s what he believes as well.”

 Professor Bloom gives him a sheet of paper and a pen and tells him to draw her the time.

He sketches a precise circle and twelve graphite numbers. Then he says, “My name is Hannibal Lecter. It is seven thirty-two. I am in the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.”

And she will leave and another psychiatrist will come and go, come and go, come and go, and after he tells them _I met a man, his name was William Graham, he was a puzzle-piece man made of shards of glass, he killed a man with eyes like cobalt and another man with a voice like titanium, he loved an amber woman and an emerald girl and he loved me, he crowned me and drew clocks for shields and forgot that he was alive,_ they will say “William Graham is not real.” And he will think about how utterly and completely wrong they are.

The invisible king will sit on his throne in a stone-wall kingdom and William Graham will brush painted lips against his skin and whisper _I feel like I’m fading_ from his place in the frame mounted on the wall.

And Hannibal will tell him _You are William Graham, it is seven thirty-two, and you are real._

And the puzzle-piece man and the invisible king will smile.


End file.
